January 20, 2010

"We won't agree on every issue... But we do agree that we love America equally, that we're concerned about the future of this country, and that we will do our very best to address big problems... The American people expect us to rise above partisan differences, and my administration will do its part...."

164 comments:

By his actions, Obama has proven that he believes bipartisanship is everyone bending their knee to his will. Even if he says the words, he has proven that every promise has an expiration date. His talk is cheap, indeed.

Congrats. You broke my super-majority and bought yourself some responsibility. Now what do you want to do with health care? What do you want to do for economic progress? What do you want to do about Afghanistan?

I look forward to your response. Keep in mind that I'm going to share your responses with the country. Try not to look like idiots.

Obama is too smug and detached from the rest of the country to say something like that. A couple of things people forget about Obama.

First, he is not an "African American". He is half white and half foreign born African. There is a big difference between Africans and African Americans. Second, he didn't grow up in a black family. He was raised by his white grandparents. He isn't from the lower 48. When he left Hawaii, he went Oxcidental, Columbia, and Harvard by way of Hyde Park Chicago and back to Chicago again. Obama has no experience of or connection to the vast majority of the country.

He has spent his entire life being told how smart he is. He has never faced any real rejection or adversity. This is going to be a Carter redo. It is going to be all about how the country has failed him and is unworthy to have Obama as President.

"Congrats. You broke my super-majority and bought yourself some responsibility. Now what do you want to do with health care? What do you want to do for economic progress? What do you want to do about Afghanistan?"

In other words, he hasn't been listening for the last year. No surprise there. No problem, however, there's time to start over.

Congrats. You broke my super-majority and bought yourself some responsibility. Now what do you want to do with health care? What do you want to do for economic progress? What do you want to do about Afghanistan?

I look forward to your response. Keep in mind that I'm going to share your responses with the country. Try not to look like idiots."

Fine:

1) We want you to fix the part of healthcare that's already under government control - like for veterans - and then apply what you learn to the rest of the country, not try to craft some bullshit in secret, with bribes, and then claim you'll explain it after it passes in the dead of night. That's simple. Think your fellow unethical retards on the Left can handle that?

2) Try cutting taxes, trimming the budget, paying down the deficit, and (I know this is hard for a socialist but) get out of the way. Believe it or not, it's worked before.

3) Afghanistan is a war. What do you do in wars? You win them. Again - too simple for you?

Hard to believe that was just fall of 2006 when Bush said that. Obama doesn't know his history that well, but someone ought to show him how fast power can disappear. (Or perhaps someone has and that's why he was trying to get it all done in year one.)

Obama's first year has been a total flop. If year two goes the same way, it could be a huge shift come November.

He should tell Pelosi and Reid to either get with his program or resign. Most major legislation passes with about 80% of the majority party and 40% of the minority party in support. The legislation must compromise to the point where that happens. In the current case the result will be center left. The republicans can live with that. The process of exclusion and governing from the left is a non-starter and brought the Dems to the edge of the cliff. Obama will be just fine if they step back and do what he said they's do in the beginning.

Bush was a classy guy, and I would be happy if Obama said something like that, but I wouldn't assume it meant anything. There is some merit to saying the right things, there is even more merit in doing the right things.

Newsflash, June4, 2017.....Today, "It was Bush's fault" supplanted "The dog ate my homework" as the nation's most popular excuse.

I think Obama and his minions need to bury this crap once and for all. The Dems have been in charge since Jan 2007, when everything was steaming along quite well. Their failure to see the trouble ahead is their fault, not Pres. Bush. They have had 4 full years in power, and the problems are theirs and theirs alone.

I like a comment from Christopher Hitchens (I think) about why men in high places risk so much by having affairs and consorting with floozies. He said, they don't risk their high place for floozies. They sought high places because they want more floozies.

So it is with Obama, but not with floozies. He sought power, not to govern, but to instill his marxist ideology into law. He does not care if we don't like it and drive him from office in 2012, so long as we become more marxist. He doesn't care how many representatives or senators are left bleeding or lose their seats, so long as the marxist transformation occurs.

He will not cooperate or compromise one bit. He has no intention of listening to the people. He is an ideologue and that's what ideologues do.

Obama hasn't pushed a SINGLE so-called "socialist" program that wasn't already underway under the administration of George W. Bush. (auto bailout, TARP)

Conservatives spent most of 2009 questioning whether the President was born in the U.S. and other assorted nonsense.

Republicans/Conservatives are not a loyal opposition. They are anarchists. The whole program of the Right is simply to humiliate the President. There is no other objective. There will be no satisfaction until they have "revenge" for the hatred that George Bush, one of the worst Presidents in our history, inspired.

I keep thinking about Obama's life and work experience and wondering whether he knows what to do now. I'm just a few years younger than he, but I have executive experience that taught me that when a big crisis comes that threatens management's strategies, you've got to call the managers into a meeting and declare that it's a new game, and we need new strategies, right away.

Has Obama ever faced such a problem? I don't think so. My guess is he really believes what we're hearing from Axelrod, Plouffe, and Gibbs: the proper course is just to stay the course.

"Most major legislation passes with about 80% of the majority party and 40% of the minority party in support. The legislation must compromise to the point where that happens. In the current case the result will be center left. The republicans can live with that."

40 years of exactly that is how we got here, where we can't afford our mortgaged future. No more baby steps leftward, thank you. If complete gridlock is the best we can do, then great. A few steps to right would be real change. A few big ones would be nation saving.

MY present nightmare is a nation populated by mouth breathing fools like you, ricpic, going around questioning "who loves America the mostest?" and discoursing about who is really for real an American, conveniently forgetting that your mongrel ancestors probably skittered over here from some european slum 100 years ago or so. You make me sick.

Republicans/Conservatives are not a loyal opposition. They are anarchists. The whole program of the Right is simply to humiliate the President. There is no other objective. There will be no satisfaction until they have "revenge" for the hatred that George Bush, one of the worst Presidents in our history, inspired.

If you really believe that, then things will get worse, and you can blame Republicans for it. In other words, continue to blame Bush. It worked before, it will work again.

Also, you said all these bailouts and stimulus started under Bush -- true -- but with a Democrat-controlled congress. I don't see how you can simply absolve Obama of these bailouts & stimulus when it was his administration that signed it into law and/or administered it with his "czars."

After a year, we can say that the stimulus succeeded in job creation --- for government. Private sector, so far, not really. The stimulus was largely a giveaway by congress-critters to their states & local governments. This was supposed to "stimulate" the economy, but just delayed the reckoning of state & local governments dealing with a decline in revenue due to the recession. And you can't replace all the private sector jobs with government jobs -- who's going to pay the taxes to keep everyone employed?

He better be rewriting his SOTU Address!And given how he has run his mouth and been grandeliquent on generalities and feel-good banalities and short on specifics...

He better swallow his immense pride and admit to going in some wrong directions and commit to specific actions to address them. Or he is the next Dubya or Jimmy Carter.

Healthcare was only 5th on the list of reasons Mass voters gave in exit polls on why they went with Brown.

Higher up:

1. Jobs. What is being done about jobs???? What needs to be done?? Too much time on side issues by Dems and the Obamites.

2. Unaccountable arrogant DC powerbrokers not listening to what us voters in Medford want. Not cutting deals with Nebraska or jetting off to Copenhagen.

3. Profound anger about the liberal Dems "soft on National Security", obsession with terrorist rights. Brown noted his poll numbers took off after the Christmas bombing when Coakley said terrorism should be left for lawyers and due process to resolve. And there were no terrorists in Afghanistan.

4. Coakley as a business as usual partisan hack who put the powers of state to work to ruin ordinary people while giving all her fellow machine hacks passes on prosecution.

5. Then healthcare....

Obama - if he takes 3 lessons from this and applies it:

1. America needs a jobs recovery, and I accept that liberal Dem policies of more government spending and more regulations on everyone and taxes on everything won't get us there. I understand I over estimated my mandate and went too far Left. The economy is Job #1.2. I agree national security is important and the focus must be on diffusing reasons of terrorism FROM ISLAMIC EXTREMISM and stopping them and taxpayers want their money used for that, and not on lawyers to defend ENEMY COMBATANTS in civilian courts. And I will commit to doing so.3. Not just on healthcare, but on a range of other issues, I allowed leaders of my Party, including myself to drift into a loss of transparency and private deals. That was wrong. I will commit to now stopping such deals and open up the process to all - even if that stalls our ending being the last major nation without healthcare for all by another year or so - but have no doubt - tens of thousands of Americans are dying from lack of health insurance, and others lives are threatened by uncontrolled costs. And this must pass!

Obama hasn't pushed a SINGLE so-called "socialist" program that wasn't already underway under the administration of George W. Bush. (auto bailout, TARP).

Yeah, that's why the republicans got whacked a year ago.

The republicans had 8 years of corruption and runaway spending and then nominated their traditional candidate who is either inarticulate (Bushes) or a disfigured gnome (Dole, McCain) and gave no reason to vote for them. "Not a democrat" is not a good enough reason when both parties want to subsidize business failures and pass out our money to their corrupt cronies.

This is a victory for the independents, just as the election of Obama was a victory for independents. The parties keep thinking that America supports them, but really we just hate one party more than the other, and that shifts with the amount of malfeasance they commit while in power.

Yeah Crack, we had it out for him from the start. It had nothing to do with the fact that he took 49% of the vote as a huge mandate to go ahead and invade Iraq, which was so worth it, and governed for 8 years like a roided-up frat boy with no clue about the other 50% of the country that he delighted in giving the middle finger to. Before leaving with the worst economy and deficit in generations.

Obama could pull a Michael jackson and turn whiter. Then the Republicans from the south may follow his lead again. No, that won't work since it isn't a racial thing...it's a failure to communicate about what the Health Care Destruction Plan would do FOR current voters. These Politburo 5 Year Plans take a little more faith in government than the Bureaucracies in DC have earned from the American people to date. What does a Death Panelist do anyway between their days spent forbidding the waste of Obama's accomplices loot on old worthless people?

Skyler said:This is a victory for the independents, just as the election of Obama was a victory for independents. The parties keep thinking that America supports them, but really we just hate one party more than the other, and that shifts with the amount of malfeasance they commit while in power.

Bouncing from one party to the next every election cycle isn't enough. I'm old enough to remember when Perot ran for president the 1st time, and I voted for him, as a protest vote against the political B.S. we heard during the campaign from Republicans and Democrats then. Clinton was too slick, and George H.W. Bush tone deaf. And the federal budget deficit was a real issue, and neither party wanted to really touch it. However, because of the divided government after 1994 there were budget surpluses after they cut defense & social spending, though the boom in tech occurred at the same time. Suddenly, a huge issue of the '92 campaign seemed to be "solved."

However, it's not enough this time for independents to simply pull the lever for R's to protest how Obama is running things. Candidates who pledge to follow conservative principles, and particularly, be fiscally accountable for their actions, are what we need. Not "go along, get along" congress critters who speak a good game, then simply get in line at the trough.

"Yeah Crack, we had it out for him from the start. It had nothing to do with the fact that he took 49% of the vote as a huge mandate to go ahead and invade Iraq, which was so worth it, and governed for 8 years like a roided-up frat boy with no clue about the other 50% of the country that he delighted in giving the middle finger to."

"We won't agree on every issue... But we do agree that we love America equally, that we're concerned about the future of this country, and that we will do our very best to address big problems... The American people expect us to rise above partisan differences, and my administration will do its part...."

Nice. I haven't heard pablum this empty and perfunctory since... George Bush!

You just hate Obama because he campaigned by saying the same things, only much better.

41 seats out of 100: A majority whose will must be respected... at least if we are going to go according to the standards of Hamas, the PLO, the Sunni Ba'athists, Hizbullah and... the GOP!

the mortgage industry just had its biggest regulatory overhaul in 30+ years go into effect January 1st. the changes have brought business almost to a complete halt. expect housing to crater in the 1st quarter as the O admin probably just regulated itself into a double dip.

Anyway, I'm loving the "resistance" movement... the party of no ideas, just emotion and what they hate and oppose. No interest in engaging the political process, just fighting and demagoguing. Here's a good idea for what their flag should look like. It's just the kind of inspiration they could use!

Dreck Obama spends years in Rev. Wright's "church" lapping up Goddamn America sermons and then superior shit Montagne calls me a mouth breather for daring to draw the conclusion that Obama hates America. Well no one with a pulse buys your lefty shit package anymore, Montagne. It's over. The giant con is over. Now go back to sucking your overdue wounds.

There is nothing more painful than a GOP who thinks that entitlements and tax cuts can co-exist with a country that isn't thrown into economic collapse, as they've already come so close to doing once - I mean, twice before.

That's quite an achievement.

Scott Brown gets two years. Who knows what his 100,000 excess constituents voted - if you can even chalk it up to one reason. Coakley doesn't represent all Democrats and Brown (probably unfortunately) doesn't represent all Republicans. He represents two years left of a senate seat in a state that enacted the reforms that he proclaims to want to stop at the federal level. But Scott Brown won't dare act like Massachusetts should repeal the same reforms! Oh no! He's happy with those! He just doesn't think the rest of the country deserves them! Fuck them!

Talk about an incoherent, mixed fucking message!

Scott Brown is just as unserious about governing as the rest of the chamber. He's just a figurehead for a less offensively outraged/outrageous GOP. Enjoy him while you can.

Scott Brown's victory was only by 100K but the bigger picture is that MA went from being a solid blue state to purplish. Suddenly a moderate Republican could win MA in a presidential race. Not Sarah Palin, but def Mitt Romney!

Ahh.... that's right! You must have the credentials to become the next chair!

Nice on the "dipshit" thing, BTW.

But I do seem to notice that Congress controls spending. The Fed can only do so much to fiddle with the dollar in a country that is at the bottom of the barrel when it comes to account balances.

Ask the fed to find a way to bail us out of that, Maguro. Go on. I triple-dog-dare ya. After all, you know what they do (vaguely) so you must have more expertise than they do on that whole creditworthiness of the nation thing.

Haven't you heard? Every Tea Partier that's worth two bags of Earl Grey knows that the collapse of the dollar is the GOP's number one joy in the art of quick money scams. Just ask Glenn Beck and everyone else at FOX about investing in gold. I'm sure they'll have a lot to say.

"My fellow Americans. Tonight I announce my immediate resignation from the office of the President. I also wish to announce the simultaneous resignations of Vice President Biden, Speaker of the House Pelosi, Senate President pro tempore Robert Byrd, Secretary of State Clinton, and Secretary of the Treasury Geithner."

President Obama might say:"I would like to address the fact that not enough hot american girls are soccer fans. I certainly do not want to fall behind the Brazlians and I hope that Senator Elect Brown and his comely daughters might help in this regard in a spirit of bi-partisanship."

But that is a nice diversion, in any event. I heard that Brown does have a couple daughters that are not so unattractive. And one of them is... how did he put it... "available"?

He certainly is a different brand of Republican. Not my father's GOP. If that's what it takes to get past the Foleys, and the Craigs, and the Sanfords, and the Barrs, and the... well, you get the point - then that's probably not such a bad thing.

Obama should say, "Last night's election was a signal that the approach to solving the problems of health care and jobs and the other issues most Americans face every day has not been successful. While the goals to improve the economy and help the millions of uninsured Americans find affordable health care are still good goals, noble goals, we need to find a new way of approaching these goals.

We were given the message that our leadership has been found wanting. I call on new leadership in the Senate and the House to find ways of overcoming the bitterness of the last few years. We need this legislation but we need it in a way that best helps our fellow citizens, those on the Left and the Right. We pushed this plan, but we cannot push it any longer. Let us invest in new directions, with new ideas, that brings together men and women from both sides of the aisle."

Everyone cheers, and Reid and Pelosi lose their leadership roles. They broke it all, they should get tossed under the bus as quickly as possible.

Obama should also replace the current Presidential limo with this one.

I was listening to Brazilian music again at work today. I love putting Mas Que Nada in an endless loop... or even designing a station with my own preferences like that on Pandora. Do you ever use Pandora, Trooper? My iPod somehow ran out of juice after going just three days uncharged (don't ask me how) and I was so peeved you wouldn't believe it. So in the mood to make the day go faster. Luckily, there's web radio.

I think conservatives would like Brazilian music. There's a freeness about it that's infused in a very 1950s Americana style of music. Think like The Chordettes or somesuch, but with a lot of back-and-forth between male and female vocalists. And singing about walking down the beach, and the water rather than Mr. Sandman.

Here's what BHO is going to say: After much thought and deliberation, I realize that I've been too hasty in pushing through my agenda. And, I have to admit: the tea partiers knew what I was about from Day One (or at least from after Ron Paul lost the election, about the same time the lithium shortage started). The "partiers" are correct: I am a Manchurian Moscow Stooge Communist Trotskyite Socialist Maoist. Caught me! Accordingly, I have decided to listen to the wisest council that the tea party has been able to offer. After days of intense thinking, the tea partiers have come up with their policy idea. Yes, there's only one, but they thought hard about it. Accordingly, I am doing what they said. I am resigning immediately. Ladies and Gentlemen, meet my replacement, as selected by the tea partiers. Good night, and good luck.

Jeez, Careen! You mean, he didn't send lewd e-mails to underage boys? He didn't pay for his mistress to have an abortion while voting against the procedure and impeaching a president for fighting an inquisition into his own affairs? He didn't solicit an agent at a Minneapolis bathroom by tapping him with his foot in the next stall?

He must be a verrrrrryyyyy bad man!

But you see, I'm not wedded to the GOP and understand when they've gotten so down and unrealistic that they can encourage the electorate to go off the rails with them. So his foibles seem a little less egregious to me.

Well Ritmo, the next time you are in New York, you should check out Via Brazil which has a great Brazilian jazz combo playing most nights and always has some really cute lovelies from Rio hanging out at the bar.

The best we have in Philly is Cuba Libre, which has couples out doing some dancing esp. during the open-air nights when the full-length windows are open. That's become a pretty common feature of the restaurants, I've noticed.

The jazz clubs aren't as well frequented here (if I get your drift).

But I'll write down your reference. That's something worth keeping in mind. Last time I was there I remember some juice bar just south of the part - but it at least gave me the impression that there was a significant Brazilian population.

Anyway, at the rate I'm going, I'll be bringing some American girl with me down to the next Carnaval.

I have no idea who Dan Brown is, but apparently he writes best-selling novels. When was the last time you made a buck that didn't involve a barrier to entry, Pogo? That didn't involve a legal labor monopoly?

I'll take my musings any day. Your pithiness wrapped around no point whatsover doesn't do you or anyone else any favors.

Oh, and BTW, does this mean you agree with Maguro?

Remember, the GOP wants to convince the electorate that they stand for something! So don't be so shy! Speak up, O quiet one!

The voters are ignorant ingrates who don't know what is best for them. We Democrats, like parents, know what is best. So, Democrats will make the public take their medicine and when they get better the public will come crawling on their knees to thank us.

You say "gridlock as if it were a bad thing. The less Congress does, the better. I mean, this country's been around for 200+ years. Most of the good laws are already finished being written.

There are times when gridlock is not such a problem and times when it is crippling. 200+ years ago we didn't face the financial crisis we now face, nor was the financial system as complex as it is now. So I have to ask why you seem to address context and the undeniable ways in which the country has grown historically as if those were bad things.

The Founders were inspired by Rome. The problem though, as it is now, is that the Senate has become obsolete. Rome fell because the Senate was gridlocked by its own two parties. That should be instructive to anyone hoping to avoid a dictatorship, as FNC seems to think we're heading toward.

Augustus was a brilliant leader, who staved off the collapse of the Roman empire for 400 years. But if we want to save the American system of government, we should try something less radical - but accept the fact that we are not living in the Founders' times. Just as Rome had to cope with changes not predicted with the deposition of their last king, we will have to cope with changes not predicted by the founders. 'cept maybe Hamilton - who industrialized the country in the first place.

The collapse of the housing bubble and the reset of the Dow to 2000 levels shows that the Bush tax rate cuts did diddley-squat for the economy. Further tax cuts will do perhaps diddley-squat to the third power. There is no more milk to be squeezed out of that particular set of teats.

Cutting the top marginal tax rate from 91 to 77% might have increased employment, I don't know. We still made most of the goods we consumed at that time. Drafting young men improved unemployment numbers, as did defense spending, especially on aerospace.

Now it may be that we have the highest business tax rates in the world. I would give US business a ten-year tax holiday on all US production and consumption. Make US tax policy the same as Singapore's.

I have ordered a review involving our sports watch list system, which our government has had in place for many years to identify winners, losers, known and suspected loosers so that we can prevent getting in that bandwagon.

After the internal review and external review, I have ordered my cabinet to make a pilgrimage to Fenway Park as soon as it is humanly possible.

At this point in time, I would just love to hear where anyone got the idea that this man would serve as president in a pragmatic manner. I surely have not seen any indication either before the election or since that pragmatism had any part in his makeup at all. What I see is that this president is so egotistical and so positive that what he wants is what we all have to want or else we are stupid mouthbreathers who should not even be considered by his administration. When does the pragmatism kick in?

Further tax cuts will do perhaps diddley-squat to the third power. There is no more milk to be squeezed out of that particular set of teats.

What a perverse perspective. Cutting taxes is not "squeezing" the government. It's not the government's money. It is the people's money before and after it is taken.

It is not the government's role to take as much as it can. It takes only as much as we allow. If we demand lower taxes, that is our right and our representatives should respond appropriately or risk getting voted out. (well, we can dream)

It is the government's further responsibility to spend responsibly so as not to bankrupt the nation. They don't seem to be catching on to that little fiduciary duty.

Cutting taxes is a "squeeze" on government as much as withdrawing your money is a squeeze on a bank. Neither the government nor the bank likes that, but it's not their option to choose.

But if you insist on calling it a squeeze, we can start by "squeezing" the businesses rewarded with a trillion dollars for the meritorious act of failing to stay solvent. Seems to me that that teat has a lot of milk in it.

I love the way our little Lefties all rejoice at the thought of our own men getting killed in places like A-stan just so they can have a couple of faux (not to mention illusory) political brownie points.

The Republicans don't have to do anything, but insist on good government. Health care is something owned by the Demos and, guess what; when somebody on the other side is digging his own grave, you don't offer to pull him out.

Besides, the Demos were obstructionists for eight years and all they got was the White House.

As for labor monopolies, that's socialism for you. Your party, as I recall, favors unions. Have a problem with it? Call Obama.

Wait... so a physician in America blames the barrier to entry and labor monopoly that he holds on socialism? That's rich! Call Flexner!

It's great to know that your remark re: Brown and Democrats didn't get in the way of the typical, muddled incoherence. Nor was it responsive of anything I said. Not sure how you came up with that straw man, but if that's what you want to imagine me saying, go for it. Fight that ghost. And tell me when you come up with another imagined bugbear to beat up.

Why should anyone respond to your tangential queries when you decline to tend to the topic at hand?

You misread, in any case (intentionally, no doubt). Guilds are no different than unions, which socialism worships. So your complaint is hypocrisy, although I know that is no sin for the left, if indeed it has any.

Did you have to pass Euclidean geometry before you made it into medical school, or did they waive that (high school) requirement for you?

Flexner limited the number of medical schools due to a concern for quality, not socialism. If you can't tell the difference, or if history doesn't matter to you, then a disdain for reality is your sin. But I hear that fantasy is more important to the right wing.

Ann, I don't know where you got that quote from or if you made it up yourself, but if you juxtapose what President Incompetent said during the campaign against Brown in all of its meandering, rambling idiocy and overlay what is being said in this quote you've put up, then the two attitudes simply convey the utter shallowness of this man. It reinforces that he is far to stupid to even understand what he just said. It harnesses the idea that he is nothing more than an empty suit that is ill-suited to even organize a beer summit.

Interns and residents argue that high salaries justify the length of time put into medical school and post-graduate training.

If you disagree, then you would have to convince yourself (and me) that the knowledge and experience taught in medical schools and residencies are over-rated. That you could put in an eighth of that time spent in class and in clinics and wards and everything would be hunky dory. And not just for PAs and nurse practitioners,... but for every one of them in the field - physicians included. The whole lot.

Now I'm not sure how medical knowledge would advance, and how well a structure you would have for promoting practitioners who excel to such a degree that they advance the state of the field. But I'm sure you have an answer for that.

When would you like to make that argument, Pogo? Your purity holds the answer to all social problems and the American people are waiting!!!

The doctor next door to me is not an MD. But all the guineas in the neighborhood go to him because he speaks Italian. Someone told me he is not an MD because he was never an intern here in America. Is that possible?

It has some truth, of course, but it's only a partial explanation for the barrier to entry it ensures.

Ahhhh.... finally Pogo stumbles upon the essential reality of life and human knowledge. Absolute truth is an illusion.

Let's see if he can keep it up:

The 'quality' issue is the useful lie guilds tell themselves so they can sleep better at night, and to convince the gullible.

Guess not, Ladies and Gents! His knee-jerking impulse to label with insults like "lie" betrays his better nature. For anything to which there is "some truth" - a relative thing, reverting to the absolutist thinking behind a word like "lie" makes the previous realization, as proper as it was, an exercise in pointlessness.

"If you disagree, then ..that the knowledge and experience taught in medical schools and residencies are over-rated."That would be a limited and stupid conclusion. There are other answers.

"That you could put in an eighth of that time spent in class and in clinics and wards and everything would be hunky dory."Whatever 'hunky dory' means.There are other ways of ensuring quality than via a monopoly guild.

"Now I'm not sure how medical knowledge would advance"That's not a terribly difficult hurdle.

I could go into detail, but your usual MULishness is rearing its ugly head, limiting my interest considerably.

I'm guessing they involve bypassing the concept of a "state board" and other civic measures of regulating businesses that purport to improve public and private health while abiding by quality standards. Because a state board, like any agency of government, is (in Pogo's mind) a form of "communism".

I could go into detail, but your usual MULishness is rearing its ugly head, limiting my interest considerably.

I could say I'm intrigued by your cryptic promise of illumination, but I'm really not.

More likely is the possibility that this is another one of your typical cop-outs. It sure sounds like one.

I really wonder what sort of utopian mechanism you envision, Pogo. Surely it will be free of any taint of government. And next, you will argue that the military should be privatized (or maybe you think people are already convinced of that) or that there should be no health inspectors making sure that rats aren't crawling through a restaurant's kitchen.

Because that would be, you know, communist and stuff.

These are the ideas of a man who apparently identifies with Walt Kelly - while turning his most famous stances completely upside-down.

I wonder when Pogo will declare the issuing of drivers' licenses by a state to be an exercise in "communism".

Fuck it. I bet he'll soon be arguing against Socrates for poisoning the young minds of ancient Greece. There never, ever was any such thing as civic virtue - let alone any form of decent government short of anarchy. Just communism.

He learned from his father well. Rebelled against his ideology but became just as fatuous an ideologue - regardless of what that ideology was. Extremism is the common thread here, and neither ideology nor rational thought have anything to do with it. I am merely taking the rhetorical and psychological place of the object of his rebellion.

Congrats. You broke my super-majority and bought yourself some responsibility...I look forward to your response. Keep in mind that I'm going to share your responses with the country. Try not to look like idiots.

Love + kisses, B.O.

Dear Mr. President: as that right-wing nutjob Jon Stewart pointed out, Bush got more done than you have, and he didn't even have a super-majority. The ball's still in your court, bro.

And as Glenn Reynolds pointed out, you "promised transparency and pragmatic good government, but delivered closed-door meetings and outrageous special-interest payoffs."

You've now directed the IRS to get tough with "tax cheats", but you've attempted to get a couple appointed to your administration.

Your lies and hypocrisy disqualify you from any kind of judgement of others. So as far as I'm concerned, just shut the f up and play some golf. You'll do less harm.

@Ritmo: "Nor is emotional consistency yours."Emotional consistency?Does that have any meaning at all?Do emotions have a chunky consistency, or are they soupy? Or mebbe more like spackle perhaps?

"I deride your hypocrisy, and nothing else."So a lawyer or architect or podiatrist or doctor or CPA or -in some states- a hairdresser who follows the US laws (which create a monopoly for the profession) and profits by it is a hypocrite unless they are a leftist?That is, one is a hypocrite for following the rules, enforced by the state, which make impossible any other effort?You're either a very strange man, Ritmo, or you need a better definition of "hypocrisy".

"I take note of complexities that your purity ...can't handle.Complexity is not the same as inconsistency. "Bullshit is not the same as complexity.

"when you take an objective view of life and history and don't politicize every development starting with the Stone Age onward."Yes, Ritmo's leftism is widely known for its apolitical approach to history.Ha ha ha. Now I know you're just messin' around.

P.S. Walt Kelly was a Truman-Kennedy Democrat. His wife, Selby, who survived him and modified his work, was a leftist. Currently, Walt would be a RINO or a blue dog at best.